/find-en/development

For all electronic gamers there is a new game platform for game development.
Platform is based on AVR microcontroller without any other external active components, and it's quite impressive. Color picture is generated on RGB monitor with simple D/A converter made out of 9 resistors. Along with hardware author has also developed a very powerful API that allows us to code our own games. Here we can see a Super Mario clone that runs on ATmega168 and it works pretty smoothly!

For all of those who don't know, there was a prize contest held here. The contestants could only be those from nearby countries (local population).
The sponsor of this contest was Protostac with their beautiful AVR development board with ATmega168. It really makes a great package in combination with their AVR programmer. Also, for all those who like Arduino this is a great and cheap starting point as the board supports Arduino ATmegas with their bootloader.

Back in September, we reviewed an AVR development board from Protostack. The board was capable of taking an ATmega8, ATmega168 or ATmega328 microcontroller and at less than $10, it was quite affordable.
Well protostack have just released a new version of the board and it's looking even better. This version brings 4 improvements, namely: new power supply section, the 6 pin ISP interface changed from 1x6 pin to 2x3 pin, new section for mounting dual row headers or similar components, power busses now have better markings, the board is available by itself or as part of an ATmega8 or ATmega168 development kit.
The developments kits include a microcontroller and other supporting components to help you get started.

Since I didn't post anything for almost a year, it would be good idea to introduce you with some of my previous and current projects that I am working on.
Project 1: Vehicle Inductive Loop Detector. This device is used to detect presence of vehicles above the wire-loop buried in road. It took me few months to perfect this project and current version of this device is v2.1 (third).Project 2: Word Clock v2. Front panel is now looking much better because I used a car tinting foil to darken not-illuminated letters. You can see the effect of this foil in the photos later. Electronics are also replaced, new PCBs were designed and factory made.Project 3: Vehicle-activated sign - a road sign that displays current vehicle's speed by using Doppler radar technology and 7-segment display. This project is currently on hold until Project 4 is done.Project 4: This project doesn't have an official name yet, but it is used to control home appliances over the Internet.

Recently I received this small digital storage oscilloscope called DSO Shell (DSO150) made by Chinese company called JYETech. Device is purchased as a KIT which means that some assembly at home is required before device can be used.
I must say that I am pleasantly surprised on how the device performs. It is a very handy 200kHz DSO that can be used to debug various signals up to 200kHz and 100Vpp.
Entire DIY assembly process can be seen in the video after the break. Video is not in english, but English subtitles are available!

This project is a very secure entry system for your house or some other protected area.
For entry it uses a PIN code in combination with Java Card™ smart card which performs a challenge-response scheme with triple DES encryption (192 bits long keys). It also has internal real-time clock and all entries through this system are dumped via RS232 port to a PC. It is built around a Keil MCB2130 development board but there is also a full schematics for LPC2138 ARM microcontroller so it can work as a stand-alone system.
It sure seems to provide better protection than those high security locks as we can see here.

If we want to work with microcontrollers it is a great advantage if we own a development board. If someone can't afford to buy one, he or she can build one themselves.
Here you can see a development board for PIC microcontrollers PIC16F877 / 874. There is no programmer on board but the programmer can be built by using just a few resistors. On project page there is also a development board for PIC16F84 micro. Both of these boards are very well built!

Electrocardiogram is based on STMicroelectronics STM32 Primer development board which has onboard LCD, USB support and STM3210B 32-bit microcontroller. On dev-board's housing two copper plates were added for skin contact and measurement signal input. Inside the dev-board there is a custom built PCB with signal amplifiers and step-up (boost) converter. Source code is available for download on project page.
This device can be used as standalone portable ECG or even as a lie detector, and there is also a PC application for real-time data plotting via USB.

There are hundreds of AVR developments boards available on the market today. What makes this one different is the amount of space available for prototyping and the adherence to a common form factor. This common form factor allows the AVR 28 pin board to be "stacked" with other Protostack boards, thereby increasing the available space and introducing a third dimension to your design.
Some of the notable features include power tracks that are routed throughout the board, de-tangling of I/O ports, AVCC filter block and dual ISP interfaces.

This week Protostack released version 1.5 of their AVR development board. Like the previous version that we reviewed back in January, this one comes with a range of improvements... 6 in fact.
The power supply section has been updated to support voltage regulators with Input/Ground/Output pinouts and Ground/Output/Input pinouts. This is achieved by using 4 plated through holes (I G O I) and a strange looking figure of 8 shaped mounting hole. The new power supply block also includes a diode and resettable fuse to protect against reverse polarity and over current.
With better port labelling, a bigger dual row block and better labelling for a CR2032 battery connector, this improves what was already an excellent development board.

Here is a very basic PCB layout for a simple PIC16F877A development and testing board. It has a voltage regulator and connector, ability to connect LEDs and inputs (switches) to any PORT, few jumpers and a crystal.
This is very useful for beginners and for prototyping with PIC for those who don't have a more serious development board.
There is also an Eagle version of this PCB with ICSP connector for easy FLASH re-programming.

So far we have seen a few DIY development boards for both PIC and AVR microcontrollers.
Now we can see a pretty minimalistic dev-board for PICs that has a LM1117 linear power regulator for 3.3V or 5V choice, PIC16F883 with 7kb FLASH memory and a few pin headers on the other side. All I/O pins of MCU are accessible on those pin headers and there is also an ICSP port for PIC programming.
The board definitely has that clean look and could be very useful.

This project is based on EasyLogger from Objective Development and is used to log temperature on PC on daily basis.
It is based on Atmel AVR ATtiny45 microcontroller and AVR USB library, also from Objective Development. The temperature sensor used here is LM34 which is an analog precision integrated-circuit temperature sensor, whose output voltage is linearly proportional to the Fahrenheit temperature. There is also a Celsius version LM35 that can be used instead. Source code and schematics is available for download on the project page.